Succulents and More™

In August, I blogged about an agave snout weevil infestation in a friend’s house a couple of blocks away. I was definitely concerned about the agaves in my garden, but I didn’t notice any suspicious signs at the time. Maybe I didn’t take it seriously enough, didn’t look carefully. If I was too complacent, I no longer am now. The day of reckoning has come, because the agave snout weevil is officially here. Agave shawii × potatorum , a beautiful hybrid by Jeremy Spath I began with me noticing that the Agave shawii × potatorum in the front yard looked a bit lopsided. Granted, Agave shawii and hybrids involving Agave shawii often have a bit of a lean to them, as if they’re reaching for the sun. But the angle on this particular plant was more pronounced than you would expect. Sure enough, when I nudged it, it wiggled every which way – an agave firmly rooted into the ground wouldn’t do that. It took very little effort to lift the entire plant straight up. This is what I found on the unde...

My posts sometimes assume a fairly advanced level of knowledge. Many of you have that, but others might feel a bit left out. To remedy that, I decided to do a series of more basic posts. Hopefully they’ll be useful for readers who are new to succulents without boring folks who are already familiar with the topic discussed. This installment of Succulents 101 is about the differences between aloes and agaves. Both are strikingly beautiful succulents often mistaken for each other because of their similar appearance. However, they belong to completely different plant families and have distinct characteristics. Aloe wickensii (in flower) and Aloe hereroensis to the left of it. The plants at top right and bottom left are agaves, the plant at top left is a yucca. Before I go into the key similarities and differences, here are some easy tells to distinguish between aloes and agaves: ❉ Easy tells In flower, aloes and agave look very different. There’s no confusing the two. See below for examp...

If you’ve followed Succulents and More for a little while, you probably know that the Ruth Bancroft Garden (RBG) in Walnut Creek, California is my favorite public garden ( click here to see my previous posts). Started by Ruth Bancroft when she was in her 60s, this dry garden is a wonderland of succulents and other plants adapted to survive with little water. Ruth lived to the venerable age of 109 (!) and saw her garden become a world-renowned showcase for xerophytic landscaping. There was no specific reason for me to go to the RBG on Black Friday, other than I didn’t have any commitments that day. As I was heading out, I realized that I hadn’t been there since February and that I hadn’t written about the RBG since my Garden of D’Lights post last December. High time to remedy that! Speaking of Garden of D’Lights: The RBG’s annual holiday light display opened on November 22 and will run until January 11 ( tickets here ). The hardware (power cords, lights, lasers, etc.) was visible, bu...